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1 Section 1 Archibald Prize and Portraiture Art Gallery of New South Wales Education Kit

PORTRAITURE AND THE PRIZE EDUCATION KIT

ART GALLERY OF NEW SOUTH WALESTOURED BY MUSEUMS & GALLERIES NEW SOUTH WALES

An education kit for K-6 Creative Arts with KLA links and 7-12 Visual Arts

www.thearchibaldprize.com.au

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Contents

General: the Archibald Prize and portraiture Who was JF Archibald?The Archibald PrizeA chronology of eventsControversy and debatePortraiture as a genre: an overviewPortraiture and the Prize: a selection of quotesList of winners since 1921

Syllabus connections: the Archibald Prize and portraiture Suggested case studies Years 7–12Conceptual framework: the art world web Years 7–12Framing the Archibald: questions for discussion Years 7–12Portraiture: general strategies Years K–6Vocabulary: portraitureArtists: portraitureReferences

Syllabus connections: 2011 Archibald Prize Framing the Archibald: questions for discussion and activities Years K–12 Analysing the winner K–6 Visual Arts and links with key learning areas Years 7–12: The framesFocus works: K–6: Visual Arts and links with key learning areas 7–12: Issues for discussion2011 Archibald Prize: selected artists

Education kit outlineThis education kit has been prepared by the Public Programs Department of the Art Gallery of New South Wales in conjunction with Museums & Galleries New South Wales, to accompany the annual Archibald Prize exhibition.

It has been designed to assist primary and secondary students and teachers in their enjoyment and understanding of the Archibald exhibition and the issues surrounding it, at the Art Gallery of NSW or throughout the 2011 Archibald Prize Regional Tour.

The education kit is comprised of three sections. Section 1 includes background information on the Archibald Prize and general information on the genre of portraiture. Section 2 includes related K–6 and 7–12 student activities, questions for discussion, suggested case studies, related vocabulary, and artist and reference lists. Revised K–6 activities in Part 2 have been developed to compliment the current K–6 syllabus and the Key Learning Areas. Section 3 includes K–6 and 7–12 student activities and questions for discussion related specifically to the 2011 Archibald Prize. Sections 2 and 3 have been written with reference to the NSW Creative Arts Syllabus, Years K–6 and the NSW Visual Arts Syllabus Years 7–12.

The kit is updated and extended each year to coincide with the announcement of the winner of the Archibald Prize.

AcknowledgementsEducation Kit Coordinator Danielle Gullotta Coordinator K-6 and Access programs Sections 1 and 2 prepared by the Public programs department Section 3 written by Danielle GullottaEditors: Julie Donaldson, Leanne Carr and Victoria Collings

M&G NSW is assisted by the NSW Government through Arts NSW and by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.

© Art Gallery of NSW and Museums & Galleries NSW 2011www.artgallery.nsw.gov.auwww.mgnsw.org.au

Cover: Crowds visit the Art Gallery of NSW to view the 1944 Archibald Prize, Sydney Morning Herald, 22 January 1945

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Museums & Galleries NSW introduction Museums & Galleries NSW (M&G NSW) is the key development agency for the museum and gallery sector in NSW. We are proud to be managing the 2011 Archibald Prize NSW Regional Tour, in partnership with the Art Gallery of NSW and principal sponsor ANZ.

Over many years now, The Archibald Prize has introduced audiences to an exciting array of art and artists. It provides students, across the school curriculum, with opportunities to engage within the context of contemporary Australian art, specifically to learn more about painting and portraiture. This year, the 2011 Archibald Prize NSW Regional Tour travels to six galleries in New South Wales. It offers teachers and students an accessible educational resource, and all schools are encouraged to take advantage of this Education Kit as an informative and supportive resource, with topics and discussion points devised in line with the current NSW curriculum.

Michael Rolfe CEO, Museums & Galleries NSW

2011 Archibald Prize Regional Tour

TarraWarra Museum of Art Victoria 1 July to 31 July 2011

Tweed River Art Gallery 5 August to 11 September 2011

Moree Plains Gallery 17 September to 23 October 2011

Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery 28 October to 4 December 2011

Casula Powerhouse 9 December to 15 January 2012

Orange Regional Gallery 20 January to 26 February 2012

Manning Regional Art Gallery 2 March to 8 April 2012

Tour dates are subject to change. Please contact venues for confirmation of dates.

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J.F ArchibaldJ.F Archibald had no desire to become famous and during his lifetime, he shunned publicity and remained evasive and enigmatic. A portrait of him, commissioned by the Trustees of the Art Gallery of NSW, was made after his death and remains as one of the pictorial records of a man who avoided having his photograph taken. Yet J.F. Archibald is the man behind one of Australia’s oldest and best known art prizes for portraiture.

He was born in Victoria in 1856, christened with the name John Feltham. When he was fifteen, he started his career in journalism on a country newspaper in Warrnambool, Victoria. His passion for newspapers lead him to Melbourne searching for work in ‘the big smoke’. He lived a bohemian life, frequenting Melbourne’s city boarding houses, streets, theatres and cafes. A life he imagined to be quite European, which led him to change his name to Jules François and later to leave money in his will for a large fountain to be built in the middle of Sydney’s Hyde Park to commemorate the association of France and Australia in World War I.

Realising the power of print, in 1880 he and a friend founded the Bulletin magazine, a radical journal for its time addressing issues of nationhood, culture and identity. This journal was

influential in shaping opinions and raising issues in the public’s consciousness. He also employed the best young artists to be its illustrators. His interest in art led him in his later years to serve as a Trustee for the Art Gallery of NSW, keen to promote the work of younger artists and writers. In 1900, he commissioned Melbourne portrait artist, John Longstaff to paint a portrait of poet Henry Lawson for fifty guineas. Apparently he was so pleased with this portrait, that he left money in his will for an annual portrait prize.

The Archibald Prize, from its outset, has aroused controversy while chronicling the changing face of Australian society. Numerous legal battles and much debate have focused on the evolving definitions of portraiture. It has become one of the most popular annual art exhibitions in Australia.

The Archibald Prize

Each year in accordance with the bequest of Jules F Archibald (1856–1919) the Trustees of the Art Gallery of NSW invite artists to submit paintings in competition for the annual Archibald Prize, to be awarded to the best portrait preferentially of a man or woman distinguished in Art, Letters, Science or Politics. The artist must have been a resident of Australia during the previous 12 months. The entries are judged by the Trustees of the Gallery and the winner currently receives a prize of $50 000.

The People’s Choice, running since 1988, is an opportunity for the public to vote for their favourite portrait in the Archibald exhibition and is awarded to the painting voted most popular by visitors. The artist receives $2500 and a $1000 ANZ Visa Debit Card for winning the People’s Choice. Each year a voter for the Archibald painting that receives the most votes is selected to win a prize – this year, $2500 and a $1000 ANZ Visa Debit Card and one nights accommodation at the Sofitel Sydney Wentworth.

The Packing Room Prize is awarded by the team behind the scenes who receive, unpack and hang all the entries in the exhibition. First awarded in 1991, it is adjudicated by the Gallery’s storeman, Steve Peters, with the winner receiving $1000 cash.

1GENERAL: THE ARCHIBALD PRIZE AND PORTRAITURE

Florence Rodway, Jules Francois Archibald 1921 Art Gallery of NSW © AGNSW

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Florence Rodway, Jules Francois Archibald 1921 Art

Gallery of NSW © AGNSW

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A chronology of events

1900 Jules François Archibald, then editor of the Bulletin, commissioned John Longstaff to paint a portrait of the poet Henry Lawson. Apparently Archibald was so pleased with the portrait that he decided to ‘write his name across Sydney’ by bequeathing money to the arts. When he died in 1919 he left one tenth of his estate of £89 061 in trust for a non-acquisitive annual art prize to be awarded by the Trustees of the (then) National Art Gallery of NSW (now the Art Gallery of NSW).

1921 The first Archibald Prize of £400 was awarded to W.B. McInnes for his portrait Desbrowe Annear.

1922 Gother Mann, Director of the National Art Gallery of NSW, in listing the conditions of the prize stated that ‘portraits should be as far as practicable painted from life and may be of any size. No direct copies from photographs will be considered eligible.’

1923 W.B. McInnes’ winning Portrait of a lady was criticised as the sitter was not named and it was therefore impossible to determine if the condition of the prize, that the portrait be ‘preferentially’ of a man or woman ‘distinguished’ in’ the Arts, Letters, Science or Politics’, was fulfiled.

1938 Nora Heyson was the first woman to win the Archibald Prize with her portrait of Madame Elink Schuurman, the wife of the Consul General for the Netherlands. Max Meldrum made the much quoted statement ‘If I were a woman, I would certainly prefer raising a healthy family to a career in art. Women are more closely attached to the physical things of life. They are not to blame. They cannot help it, and to expect them to do some things equally as well as men is sheer lunacy.’

1942 William Dargie won the prize with his portrait Corporal Jim Gordon, VC. The work was painted when Dargie was an official war artist in Syria. The ship carrying the portrait back to Sydney sank and the painting spent some time underwater.

1943 William Dobell won the award for Joshua Smith. Raymond Lindsay, writing for The Daily Telegraph, noted ‘it is daring to the point of caricature, but its intense vitality lifts it from any such moribund definition. It has all the qualities of a good painting.’ When the award was announced, two other entrants Mary Edwards and Joseph Wolinski, took legal action against Dobell and the Trustees on the ground that the painting was not a portrait as defined by the Archibald Bequest. The case was heard from the 23–26 October in the Supreme Court of NSW before Justice Roper, who dismissed the suit and ordered the claimant to pay costs for Dobell and the Trustees. This was followed by an appeal and an unsuccessful demand to the Equity Court to restrain the Trustees from handing over the money.

1946 For the first time the Trustees had to insist upon a pre-selection of works. More than half of the entries were eliminated.

1948 William Dobell won both the Archibald and Wynne Prizes. His winning portrait Margaret Olley was purchased by the National Art Gallery of NSW.

1952 William Dargie’s winning portrait

Mr Essington Lewis, CH provoked an art students’ demonstration. Students, including John Olsen, marched around the Gallery, gave three cheers for Picasso and left. A woman in the demonstration tied a placard around the neck of her dachshund, which read ‘Winner Archibald Prize – William Doggie.’

1953 The first show of the Archibald ‘rejects’ took place from 20–27 February at the Educational Galleries, Bridge Street.

1964 The Trustees decided not to award the prize on the grounds that the entries were not of a sufficient standard.

1975 John Bloomfield’s portrait Tim Burstall, painted from a blown-up photograph, was disqualified on the grounds that the portrait had to be painted from life. The prize was rejudged and awarded to Kevin Connor.

1976 Brett Whiteley’s Self portrait in the studio was a turning point, as it challenged traditional tenets of likeness and realism and stretched the definition of portraiture.

1978 Brett Whiteley won the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes becoming the first artist to win all three prizes in one year.

1980 The Trustees, for the second time, decided not to award the prize on the grounds that there was no entry worthy of the award.

1981 John Bloomfield threatened to take legal action to prevent Eric Smith being awarded the prize for Rudy Komon, as he claimed Smith had not adhered to a condition of entry, that the portrait should be painted from life.

1985 The Perpetual Trustee Company, which administered Archibald’s will, took the Australian Journalists Association Benevolent Fund to court. The AJA was named as first defendant in the case because it stood to inherit the money if the Archibald Prize failed to fulfill the criteria that the prize was still a ‘good charitable bequest.’ Justice Powell found that the Archibald Prize did fulfill this and directed that the Perpetual Trustees Company should transfer administration of the Trust to the Art Gallery of NSW.

1988 The People’s Choice Award was established.

1994 The entry fee for artists was increased to $25: there were 174 fewer entries than the previous year.

1995 The Archibald Prize application form was amended to read: ‘For the purpose of this prize the Trustees apply the definition of a portrait as determined in the judgment of 1983: ‘a picture of a person painted from life’. This refers to John Bloomfield’s unsuccessful attempt in 1983 to sue for the return of the 1975 Archibald Prize. (see 1975)

1996 To coincide with the 75th anniversary of the prize a mini-retrospective of selected past winners was mounted.

1997 The eligibility of a painting of ‘Bananas in Pyjamas’ television characters B1 and B2 was questioned by the Trustees, as it was not a portrait

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of a ‘man or woman’. Artist Evert Ploeg pointed out that his subjects were distinguished in the arts and that the portrait was painted from life, the only difference being that the subjects were in costume.

The Salon des Refuses, now an annual exhibition (held outside the Art Gallery of NSW), of works that were not hung in the Archibald Prize was organised to protest against the predominance of established regulars in the Archibald exhibition.

1999 Euan Macleod’s winning work, Self portrait/ head like a hole, received wide spread acclaim as a strong, imaginative painting. It was described by the Daily Telegraph of 20 March 1999 as ‘arguably the most abstract painting ever to win the prize’. The Trustees’ announcement was greeted with raucous whooping and cheering for the first time chairman David Gonski could recall.

2000 Rendered in Dulux house paints because they were ‘rich, inexpensive and bright’ Adam Cullen’s winning work Portrait of David Wenham, drew praise for the Trustees from the Sydney Morning Herald of 25 March 2000 for their imaginative choice commenting that ‘the daggiest award in Australian art is beginning to look serious’.

2001 A record increase in the number of entries may have been stimulated by awards to more adventurous works during the previous two years. Public attendance at the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman exhibitions reached its highest ever daily average, at 1725 visitors per day (compared with 1388 per day in 2000).

2003 A size limitation is introduced. Entries can be no larger than 90 000 square centimetres, for example, 3 metres by 3 metres or 4.5 metres by 2 metres. This was a decision made after the 2002 exhibition, with excessively large works creating handling, judging and storing difficulties, as well as restricting the number that can fit in the exhibition. Another restriction introduced for the 2003 Archibald Prize is the limit of one work per artist.

The inaugural Citigroup Private Bank Australian Photographic Portraiture Prize is held in conjunction with the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes.

2004 Craig Ruddy’s portrait David Gulpilil – two worlds wins the 2004 Archibald Prize and the People’s choice award. Only the second time in 16 years has the public agreed with the judge’s decision. A record number 60 133 people voted in this year’s People’s Choice for the Archibald Prize.

How popular is the Archibald Prize? According to London’s The Art Newspaper, March 2005, Australia’s best-loved portrait prize came ninth in a listing of contemporary art exhibitions around the globe for 2004. With 116 501 visitors, the Archibald Prize found itself in the company of Gerhard Richter and Rachel Whiteread at the Bilbao Guggenheim, James Rosenquist at the New York Guggenheim, and Chuck Close at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

2005 John Olsen’s self portrait Janus faced is the winner of the 2005 Archibald Prize. Olsen has had an interesting relationship with the Prize. As a student he demonstrated against the Trustee’s decision on the winning portrait (see 1952) and has only entered a portrait once before this year. Janus is the Roman god of doorways, passages and

bridges. In art he is depicted with two heads facing in opposite directions.

‘Janus had the ability to look backwards and forwards and when you get to my age you have a hell of a lot to think about.’ John Olsen 2005

2006 Marcus Wills’ painting The Paul Juraszek monolith (after Marcus Gheeraerts) won the 85th Archibald Prize. Inspired by the etching Allegory of iconoclasm by Marcus Gheeraerts the elder, a Flemish engraver, illustrator and painter. Wills saw the etching in a book whilst researching and thought he would like to do something with it. Casting around for a subject for his own version, Wills thought of Paul Juraszek, a Melbourne-based sculptor, who creates mostly animals from myths and legends. ‘As it turned out he suited the subject even better than I could possibly have imagined,’ says Wills. Juraszek appears in the painting 29 times taking a good year to complete.

2007 John Beard won for his painting of Janet Laurence, an installation artist whose work extends from the gallery into urban spaces. A former AGNSW trustee, she has undertaken numerous public commissions. John Beard’s monochromatic portraits of fellow artists share similar qualities. While painting the structure, or architecture, of his friends’ heads and faces, he also aims to capture the sense of fleeting, ever-changing expression. Beard focused the viewer’s attention not just on the individual sitter but on the structure of the painting itself. 2008 Del Kathryn Barton wins the 2008 Archibald prize now valued at $50 000 for You are what is most beautiful about me, a self portrait with Kell and Arella.This self-portrait depicts the artist with her son and daughter. Barton’s work is known for it’s vibrant, figurative imagery, Barton’s work combines traditional painting techniques with contemporary design and illustrative styles.

2009 Guy Maestri wins with the portrait of Indigenous singer Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu. Born blind, the gifted musician leads a traditional lifestyle on Elcho Island in Arnhem Land and sings in his native Yolngu language. Maestri says he ‘got a sense of his presence and this determined the nature of the portrait: quiet and strong’. Maestri built up this portrait slowly while listening to the music of Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu. ‘The whole process became quite an emotional experience’ commented Maestri.

2010 This year, the 89th year of Archibald, 849 paintings were entered. Sam Leach won this year’s prize with his portrait of Tim Minchin. This is the second year in Archibald’s history that an artist has won both the Archibald and the Wynne prizes in the same year, the first being William Dobell in 1948. Brett Whiteley won all three prizes, Archibald, Wynne and Sulman, in 1978.

2011 Ben Quilty is unanimously awarded the Archibald Prize for his portrait of Margret Olley. Quilty met Olley when she was a guest judge for the 2002 Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship, which he won. ‘She’s such an inspiration,’ says Quilty. ‘She was a feminist ahead of her time. She’s vigorously passionate about social and political issues, as well as art. In 1948 Olley was the subject of William Dobell’s Archibald Prize winning portrait which is in the collection of the AGNSW.

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Controversy and debate

First awarded in 1921, the Archibald Prize quickly became a prize eagerly sought by artists, not only because of the money it offered and the publicity and public exposure it generated, but because it also gave portrait artists an opportunity to have their work shown in a major gallery. Previously, portraitists had been largely restricted to public or private commissions and these exhibitions allowed their artwork to be viewed as a serious art form.

Early in its history the Archibald Prize attracted conservative artists who were not involved in the Modernist Movement characteristic of the Sydney art scene in the 1920s. Academic and tonal realism dominated the first decade – noting in particular W.B. McInnes who won the prize five times between 1921 and 1926. As a result, through the 1920s and 1930s many artists seeking the prestigious and important Archibald Prize painted ‘prize’ paintings, adapting their own styles to conform with the prize winning aesthetic of tonal realism.

With the Archibald terms stipulating a portrait of a ’distinguished’ man or woman, the award mostly attracted celebratory portraits of notable Australians. Many of the Archibald contenders turned to the traditions of public portraiture of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries which was to focus on the social role of the sitter – for example, as a monarch, bishop, landowner or merchant – rather than an individual with a unique personality and psychological make-up.

William Dargie’s winning paintings from the 1940s very much reflected this ideal of the social role of the sitter, but his seventh portrait in 1952, Mr Essington Lewis, CH, a technically conservative and predictable portrait, sparked art students’ demonstrations and the first exhibition of rejected Archibald entries. Nevertheless, even in its first two decades, there were occasional diversions from the social role of the sitter, such as Henry Hanks Self portrait in 1934, in which he depicted himself as an unemployed painter and tattily dressed. He was criticised for apparently ignoring the award’s terms specifying the portrayal of a ‘distinguished’ man or woman.

But it was William Dobell’s prize winning portrait of fellow artist Joshua Smith in 1943, which finally broke with the conventions that had been established with the Archibald. Hunt describes the portrait as being ‘haunted with vivid expressive colours, linear distortion and almost mannerist attenuation of form’. Opposition to the win was intense and two Royal Art Society members, Joseph Wolinski and Mary Edwards, took legal action against Dobell and the Trustees, alleging that Joshua Smith was ‘a distorted and caricatured form’ and therefore not a portrait. In contrast, the supporters of Dobell described the portrait as both ‘a likeness or resemblance of the sitter and a work of art’, which allowed for distortion for the purpose of art.

In response to critics Dobell said that when he painted a portrait he was ‘... trying to create something, instead of copying something. To me, a sincere artist is not one who makes a faithful attempt to put on canvas what is in front of him, but one who tries to create something which is living in itself, regardless of its subject. So long as people expect paintings to be simply coloured photographs they get no individuality and in the case of portraits, no characterisation. The real artist is striving to depict his subject’s character and to stress the caricature, but at least it is art which is alive.’

The case stimulated massive press coverage and public comment – by those both familiar and totally unfamiliar with art. Ultimately, the Dobell case became a lively debate about Modernism. The question of whether the painting was portraiture or caricature equally asked the questions of what constituted a portrait and what was the relationship of realism to art in general. Justice Roper upheld Dobell’s award on the grounds that the painting, ‘although characterised by some startling exaggeration and distortion... nevertheless bore a strong degree of likeness to the subject and undoubtedly was a pictorial representation of him.’

By the 1960s Archibald artists were facing the problems of trying to reconcile the essentially conservative and restrictive conventions of portraiture with the demands of modernism – which had no interest in naturalism or realism; in particular, the abstract art of the 1950s and 1960s contested with the figurative restrictions of portraiture. Hunt cites Judy Cassab as responding to this problem with her winning portraits Stanislaus Rapotec in 1960 and Margo Lewers in 1967 in which the figures are enlivened by respectively a green-black grid and blocks of blue. Nevertheless, within this perceived enlightened sense of judging, the Trustees reverted to traditional form with the award going to William Pidgeon in 1961 for Rabbi Dr I. Porush.

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While the Archibald Prize never failed to stimulate debate, controversy yet again loomed when, in 1976, Brett Whiteley won with his painting Self portrait in the studio, marking a turning point for the prize. The self portrait is seemingly reduced to the artist’s face reflected in a hand mirror within the vast expanse of the blue of his studio and its collection of objects. According to Hunt, Whiteley ‘had produced an extraordinary, compelling work because he was committed to creating “something which is a living thing in itself”, regardless of its subject.’ Whiteley followed this win with an even more expressive work in 1978: Art, life and the other thing, a triptych that explored three issues—the status of photographic representation in portraiture, the Dobell controversy and the representation of Whiteley’s own battle with heroin addiction.

Whiteley’s reference to photographic representation presumably dealt with yet another Archibald controversy: portraits painted from photographs. In 1975, John Bloomfield’s large photo realist portrait Tim Burstall, the film maker, was disqualified as it was painted from a photograph and because Bloomfield had never met Burstall. In this case the debated point was the justification of portraiture as revealing the inner self of the sitter rather than being simply a faithful rendering of facial features. Bloomfield struck back in 1981 when he threatened legal action over that year’s winning portrait by Eric Smith, Rudy Komon, which strongly resembled a 1974 photograph of Komon. Komon defended the award saying he had been sitting for Smith for twenty one years.

These two cases highlight the debate about the nature of portraiture: is it about getting a good likeness or is it about character revelation?

Adapted from Susan Hunt, The Archibald Prize 1921–1993, Art Gallery of NSW.

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Portraiture as genre: an overview

The Roman writer Pliny, tells us that portraiture originated in tracing lines around the human shadow, to record the features of a person who no longer stood in that place. The absence of a loved one through death or physical circumstance was erased by the presence of his Polygnoeus (c.450 BC) painted in outline on a Greek vase.

A portrait can be made for a number of reasons—as an historical record, a personal tribute, remembrance or token of friendship, a glorification of an individual’s status or position, or a simple gratification of vanity and indicator of fashion.

Beyond these specific non-art purposes, portraiture offered special challenges, which attract some artists more than others. It poses more than questions of artistic form; it involves the study of humanity in a very specific way, probing the individual mind as well as recording the external appearance of a subject.

For many years portraiture has been one of the most reliable sources of bread and butter income for artists. If a portrait is commissioned, then both the price and the sale of the work (provided the sitter is satisfied with the result) are guaranteed. This is not the case with most of the other works an artist may produce, where he or she relies on a dealer to find a market and a good price, and in some cases may not sell at all. The obvious advantages of commissioned work are however to be weighed against the degree of compromise that pleasing a client may impose on an artist’s way of working. Often, fashionable portrait painters developed styles that attracted commissions, and their clients were more than happy to join a celebrated list of notables immortalised in paint.

Modern art movements have challenged the traditional role and definition of portraiture. While the production of a good likeness still has the power to delight and amaze, the development of abstract and conceptual art forms this century has made many of the traditional delights of portraiture seem old-fashioned. At the same time, the experimental approaches of modernist artists have also expanded the interpretive tools of portraiture. A face can be expressively distorted, certain features exaggerated, the colours heightened, or the geometry of the figure brought out to emphasise the character or temperament of the sitter, or to highlight purely formal qualities of the figurative subject.

When an artist paints a portrait, the difficulty is that he or she has to get an individual likeness and make a picture that is formally resolved, or well composed. The likeness can be photographically exact or realistic, or it can be a more general impression of character and temperament conveyed by colour, line, tone or fragmented forms. Because the 20th and 21st Century is an age that is less sympathetic to the traditional goals of portraiture than any other, it is surprising that the art form has survived as strongly as it has. Competition from the camera has also challenged the role of the portrait painter in society - nonetheless, in Australia portraiture is currently widely practiced, and the annual and always controversial Archibald Prize conducted by the Art Gallery of NSW, has something to do with the lively state of the art.

Activities• According to Pliny, portraiture originated in tracing lines around the human shadow. As a class activity, try

casting a shadow from each students’ facial profile onto a piece of paper taped onto a wall or window of the classroom. This is easily done using either a slide projector (without the slide inside), or an overhead projector.

• Portraits are made for a number of reasons – historical record, personal tribute, remembrance or token of friendship, glorification of status, gratification of vanity, indicator of fashion and style and others. Use the printed list of the works in the current Archibald Prize and briefly note why each was made or what it is revealing about the person.

• The Archibald Prize requires an artist to paint a portrait of someone ‘distinguished in art, letters, science or politics’. List some of the different professions of the sitters in the current exhibition. Comment on the ratio of men to women.

• List three portraits from the current exhibition that reveal something of the sitter’s personality. Investigate how the artist communicates this to the audience?

• Choose two portraits from the current exhibition and two from art history, in which the background or surrounding environment is important in revealing the character of the sitter. How is this achieved? Explain. Compare and contrast these four works.

From top:

Agnolo Bronzino, Duke Cosimo 1 de ‘ Medici in armour, 1503–1572Rembrandt van Rijn, Samuel Manasseh Ben Israel, 1636Tom Roberts, Eileen, 1892Sidney Nolan, Self Portrait, 1943 © Estate of Sidney NolanWilliam Dobell, Dame Mary Gilmore, 1957 © Sir William Dobell Art Foundation

All works from the Art Gallery of NSW

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Portraiture and the Prize: a selection of quotes

All the houses of Venice contain numerous portraits, and several noble houses have of their ancestors to the fourth generation, while some of the noblest go even farther back. The custom is an admirable one, and was in use among the ancients ... To what other end did the ancients place the images of their great men in public places, with laudatory inscriptions, except to kindle those who come after to virtue and glory! Giorgio Vasari, writer and artist, Lives of Painters, 1568

Mr Lely, I desire you would use all your skill to paint my picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it. Oliver Cromwell, 1650

By portraits I do not mean the outlines and the colouring of the human figure but the inside of the heart and mind of man. Lord Chesterfield, 1747

A history painter paints man in general; a portrait painter, a particular man, and consequently a defective model. Sir Joshua Reynolds, artist, 1769-90

One is never satisfied with the portrait of a person one knows. Johann Wolfgang van Goethe, 1808

Take note, young man, that the portrait should not be a reflection in a mirror, a daguerreotype produces that far better. The portrait must be a lyric poem, through which a whole personality, with all its thoughts, feelings and desires, speaks. Arthur Schopenhauer, philosopher, 1856

To sit for one’s portrait is like being present at one’s own creation. Alexander Smith, 1863

You would scarcely believe the difficulty of placing a single figure on a canvas, and of focusing all the interest on this solitary and unique figure while keeping it alive and real. Edouard Manet, artist, 1880

It is for the artist to do something beyond this [imitation]: in portrait painting to put on canvas something more than the face the model wears for that one day; to paint the man, in short, as well as his features. James McNeil Whistler, artist, The Gentle Art of Making Enemies, 1890

Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. Oscar Wilde, writer, The Portrait of Dorian Gray, 1891

When I paint a person, his enemies always find the portrait a good likeness. He himself believes, however, that all other portraits are good likenesses except the one of himself. Edvard Munch, artist

In order for a portrait to be a work of art it must not resemble the sitter. Umberto Boccioni, artist, Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, 1910

I do not paint a portrait to look like the subject, rather the subject grows to look like his portrait. Salvador Dalí, artist

The Archibald Prize has done nothing for art. William Dobell, artist, 1948

I consider the individuality of the artist the least important thing in a painting. William Dargie, artist, 8 times winner of Archibald during 1940’s and 50’s

The Archibald Prize is not so much a competition as a myth. Robert Hughes, art critic, 1962

Sydney is a city that likes to perv on people. Portraiture is one of the most revealing and satisfying ways of exercising voyeurism.Edmund Capon, Director, Art Gallery of NSW, 1996

My profile was lifted and sales of my work rocketed. Now, even if people don’t know my work, the Archibald is known to people both in and outside the (art) industry, so it’s a real advantage. Wendy Sharpe, artist, 1999

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I never call myself a portraitist. I use people as a starting point or as the subject matter of an artwork and I try to avoid a psychological investigation. Adam Cullen, artist, 2002

The best of portraits like Rembrandt for instance are the kind of infinite disclosures of aspects of that person’s existence through time and that’s an ongoing thing and there’s no closure in that. Lindy Lee, artist, 2002

It gives people an opportunity to show their work in the Gallery who otherwise wouldn’t. Some of whom are not professional artists which in some ways is an extraordinary liberty for a gallery, many of who otherwise wouldn’t come to this place, which once again I think on both counts are really wonderful aspects for the prize. Ben Genocchio, art critic, The Australian, 2002

Painting a portrait is as much about the sittings, about becoming acquainted with them and drawing them as it is about the painting.Nicholas Harding, artist, 2003

There’s a fantasy that winning the Archibald changes your life. That’s a fairytale. What it does is focus people’s attention on an artist’s work.Ray Hughes, Sydney Gallery owner, 2004

And when I am asked how many portraits have I done, I say how many breaths have I taken? [ I have been ] doing portraits since I was 12.Judy Cassab, artist, 2004

(The Archibald Prize is) of the people, by the people, for the people.Edmund Capon, Director AGNSW, 2004

It’s the one event where public opinion does not feel it has to subscribe to curatorial knowledge. People are always curious about other people’s circumstance, their situation. There’s a kind of discreet perving going on here. It’s a very public event and I think the general public feels a strange sense of ownership of the Archibald. This is the one time they can feel almost participants.Edmund Capon, Director AGNSW, 2005.

Sometimes painting becomes sculptural. The first effort became the study and the next was more free-flowing and easy, very fresh. I made it in a few hours, started it at Windsor and finished it at Woolloomooloo.Ben Quilty, artist and 2005 & 2006 Archibald finalist

I worked on it for over a month, mostly while listening to his music. The whole process became quite an emotional experience. Guy Maestri, 2009

Quotes sourced from:

Rosalie Higson, ‘Celebrating a lifetime’s Poetic reflection’, The Austrailan, March 5 2004

Joyce Morgan, ‘Enter at your own Risk’, Sydney Morning Herald, Spectrum, March 6–7 2004

Rosalie Higson, ‘Some behind-the-scenes canvasing’, The Australian, March 9 2004

Art Gallery of NSW, Archibald Prize video, 2002

Ian Crofton, A Dictionary of Art Quotations, London Routledge, 1988

Look Magazine March 1999

Lyndall Crisp, ‘Hard call for hanging judges’, The Weekend Financial Review, 2005

Alison Mills, ‘Artistic journey takes painter from Paris to Pit Town’, Hawkesbury Independent, April 2005

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List of winners since 1921

1921 WB McInnes Desbrowe Annear

1922 WB McInnes Professor Harrison Moore

1923 WB McInnes Portrait of a lady

1924 WB McInnes Portrait of Miss Collins

1925 John Longstaff Portrait of Maurice Moscovitch

1926 WB McInnes Silk and lace

1927 George W. Lambert Mrs Murdoch

1928 John Longstaff Portrait of Dr Alexander Leeper

1929 John Longstaff WA Holman, KC

1930 WB McInnes Drum-Major Harry McClelland

1931 John Longstaff Sir John Sulman

1932 Ernest Buckmaster Sir William Irvine

1933 Charles Wheeler Ambrose Pratt

1934 Henry Hanke Self portrait

1935 John Longstaff AB (‘Banjo’) Paterson

1936 WB McInnes Dr Julian Smith

1937 Normand Baker Self portrait

1938 Nora Heysen Mme Elink Schuurman

1939 Max Meldrum The Hon GJ Bell, Speaker, House of Representatives

1940 Max Meldrum Dr J Forbes McKenzie

1941 William Dargie Sir James Elder, KBE

1942 William Dargie Corporal Jim Gordon, VC

1943 Willian Dobell Joshua Smith

1944 Joshua Smith S. Rosevear, MHR, Speaker

1945 William Dargie Lt-General The Hon Edmund Herring, KBC, DSO, MC, ED

1946 William Dargie LC Robson, MC, MA

1947 William Dargie Sir Marcus Clarke, KBE

1948 William Dobell Margaret Olley

1949 Arthur Murch Bonar Dunlop

1950 William Dargie Sir Leslie McConnan

1951 Ivor Hele Laurie Thomas

1952 William Dargie Mr Essington Lewis, CH

1953 Ivor Hele Sir Henry Simpson Newland, CBE DSO MS FRCS

1954 Ivor Hele Rt Hon RG Menzies, PC CH QC MP

1955 Ivor Hele Robert Campbell Esq.

1956 William Dargie Mr Albert Namatjira

1957 Ivor Hele Self Portrait

1958 William Pidgeon Mr Ray Walker

1959 William Dobell Dr Edward MacMahon

1960 Judy Cassab Stanislaus Rapotec

1961 William Pidgeon Rabbi Dr I Porush

1962 Louis Kahan Patrick White

1963 J Carrington Smith Professor James McAuley

1964 No Award

1965 Clifton Pugh RA Henderson

1966 Jon Molvig Charles Blackman

1967 Judy Cassab Margo Lewers

1968 William Pidgeon Lloyd Rees

1969 Ray Crooke George Johnston

1970 Eric Smith Gruzman – architect

1971 Clifton Pugh Sir John McEwan

1972 Clifton Pugh The Hon EG Whitlam

1973 Janet Dawson Michael Boddy

1974 Sam Fullbrook Jockey Norman Stephens

1975 Kevin Connor The Hon Sir Frank Kitto, KBE

1976 Brett Whiteley Self portrait in the studio

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1977 Kevin Connor Robert Klippel

1978 Brett Whiteley Art, life and the other thing

1979 Wes Walters Portrait of Philip Adams

1980 No award

1981 Eric Smith Rudy Komon

1982 Eric Smith Peter Sculthorpe

1983 Nigel Thomson Chandler Coventry

1984 Keith Looby Max Gillies

1985 Guy Warren Flugelman with Wingman

1986 Davida Allen Dr. John Arthur McKelvey Shera

1987 William Robinson Equestrian self portrait

1988 Fred Cress John Beard

1989 Bryan Westwood Portrait of Elwyn Lynn

1990 Geoffrey Proud Dorothy Hewett

1991/92 Bryan Westwood The Prime Minister

1992/93 Garry Shead Tom Thompson

1993/94 Francis Giacco Homage to John Reichard

1995 William Robinson Self portrait with stunned mullet

1996 Wendy Sharpe Self portrait – as Diana of Erskineville

1997 Nigel Thomson Barbara Blackman

1998 Lewis Miller Portrait of Allan Mitelman no 3

1999 Euan MacLeod Self portrait/head like a hole

Highly commended: Adam Cullen Max Cullen

2000 Adam Cullen Portrait of David Wenham

Highly commended: Jenny Sages Each morning when I wake up I put on my mother’s face + Garry Shead Sasha Grishin

2001 Nicholas Harding John Bell as King Lear

Highly commended: Jenny Sages Jackie and Kerryn

2002 Cherry Hood Simon Tedeschi unplugged

2003 Geoffrey Dyer Richard Flanagan

2004 Craig Ruddy David Gulpilil, two worlds

2005 John OlsenSelf portrait Janus faced

2006 Marcus Wills The Paul Juraszek monolith (after Marcus Gheeraerts)

Highly commended: Jenny Sages Hossein Valamanesh

2007 John Beard Janet Laurence

2008 Del Kathryn Barton You are what is most beautiful about me, a self portrait with Kell and Arella

2009 Guy Maestri Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu

2010 Sam Leach Tim Minchin

2011 Ben Quilty Margaret Olley

Regarding the non-awarding of the Archibald Prize for 1964 and 1980On 22 January 1965 Hal Missingham, the director of the Gallery, announced ‘After careful consideration the trustees unanimously decided not to award the prize for 1964, as they felt that no submitted entry was worthy of the award. They accordingly exercised their discretion under clause 10 of the conditions.’ This clause allowed the Gallery not to award the prize and to use the money to purchase any portrait that had won the prize. This was the first time the clause was invoked.

In 1980 the trustees again unanimously decided that no entry was deserving of the prize.